The present invention relates to a dual-purpose shoe, and more particularly to a shoe having wheel assemblies retractably mounted to an outsole of the shoe, so that the shoe functions like a roller skate when wheels of the wheel assemblies are exposed from the outsole.
There are various types of skates available in the markets, such as four-wheeled roller skates, in-line roller skates, hockey skates, etc. All these skates are designed only for one purpose, that is, skating, and are not suitable for wearing to talk. To go to a skating rink, a skater has to wear ordinary shoes and brings a pair of skates along with him or her. After skating, the skater has to change the shoes to the ordinary ones and bring the pair of skates home. It is naturally very troublesome for the skater to do so.
In recent years, the skates, particularly roller skates, are found very useful in large-scaled shopping malls. Workers of the shopping malls often need to move from place to place in the same and different floors to check and supply goods on shelves. By wearing roller skates or in-line skates, these workers are able to move around on floors quickly and effortlessly. However, it is very danger to move up and down stairs and on rough surfaces when wearing these roller or in-line skates. They even endanger the wearers at such places by causing falls and sprained ankles.
It is therefore a primary object of the present invention to provide a dual-purpose shoe that can be easily changed between two modes at any time to function either as an ordinary shoe suitable for walking or as a roller skate suitable for moving smoothly and effortlessly at increased speed, simply depending on the wearer""s actual needs.
To achieve the above and other objects, the dual-purpose shoe of the present invention mainly includes an outsole having increased thickness for forming two open-bottomed cavities. In each of the cavities, there is mounted a wheel assembly that includes a fixing bracket screwed to a top of the cavity, a wheel holder movably mounted in the fixing bracket, a wheel rotatably supported on the wheel holder, arid a pair of control plates fixed to two sides of the fixing bracket to connect at an end to the wheel holder. The control plates of each of the wheel assemblies mounted in the cavity are connected to an external knob. Turning the knob clockwise or counterclockwise causes the control plates to pivotally turn and thereby bring the wheel holder to move upward or downward in the fixing bracket. When all the wheel holders of one shoe are moved upward, the wheels retract into the cavities and the shoe functions like an ordinary shoe, and when the wheel holders are moved downward, the wheels expose from the cavities and the shoe functions like a roller skate.